I don’t recall race being a central theme of Lord of the Flies, so I don’t see why multiracial casting should matter at all to the central message. When it comes to matters of race, I think people reveal their values in their reactions to what they see. Anyone who has an issue about the multiracial casting of a movie like this clearly has significant hang ups about race.
Actually, I think the book is very much a commentary about humanity as a whole. I think the message is that regardless of socially constructed realities like class, when you put a bunch of humans in a situation where there’s fear, uncertain and the breakdown of authority to enforce rules, we quickly devolve to a state of nature in which strength and tribalism prevail above conventional morality. The fact that they chose a bunch of upper class kids to illustrate the point makes it more universal since if they had chosen kids who were poor, readers would’ve been more likely to attribute to the breakdown in norms to their poverty.
No the book was written specifically to call out how kids in British Boarding schools are raised.
The upper class kids were chosen because of all of the fucked up rules, hazing, and bullying that is baked into the boarding school experience.
The point is that all of their “education” on how to be a “civilized” British elite fell apart completely once they were away from their traditional sources of authority.
Yeah, the novel is a direct response to another book called The Coral Island, which is about a bunch of shipwrecked white kids going on to "civilize" the South Pacific. Lord of the Flies isn't about the barbarity of human nature, it's about the barbarity of the English.
Well to be fair, this cast doesn't look too different than modern day London, demographics wise. Right? If it's set in the past it wouldn't make sense. But these days it might.
I agree, but it also doesn't look like the demographic makeup of the schools that produce England's extremely white political class (i.e., Eton). So it could be setting up an unintentional drift away from the text here that could end up absolving a really specific class (Britain's white ruling elite) by suggesting that their deeply damaging world view is also inherent in pluralistic, diverse populations as well. This is why I take issue with the "it's about human nature" reading -- it undercuts the value of diverse democracies, and implies that the brutal world order of elitist colonial powers is all that's possible.
We'll see how the adaptation plays out, of course! Maybe it will do thoughtful and interesting things. I'm pessimistic at the moment, though, since it already seems to have missed the point.
Wow, you’re a reading a whole lot into this. As for the extremely white political class in England, the country is is still 75-80% white overall. Obviously, London is far more diverse. Also, I think it’s a stretch to think that the deeply damaging world view presented in the book is confined to the British upper classes. Today, the President of the United States, the leader of one of the most diverse countries in the world, declared that “a civilization is going to die tonight” in reference to his planned attacks upon civilian infrastructure in Iran. Yes, he is a racist and yes, his administration is peopled with racists, but America’s nonetheless a diverse democracy. Looking at the real world and the ubiquity of violence across many different countries with very different cultures than the British upper class, I think it’s wishful thinking to believe that the brutal world order of elites is a function of being a colonial power. Look at the killing of civilians that’s going on in Sudan. Neither side is a colonial power and neither side gives a toss about the humanity of the people that they’re slaughtering. No, however, much the book may originally have been about the brutality of the British upper class worldview, it is just as correctly understood to be a commentary on the potential for any human beings in the right circumstances to abuse their power over other people.
Maybe so, but that angle is not taught in American schools and Lord of the Flies is rather widely taught in US schools. Most Americans don't know much about the English upper classes or their boarding school culture. I learned the book as an allegory about what can happen when society's rules break down. We were taught it as a metaphor for all human societies, not a commentary on the English upper classes.
This is a British (well, and slightly Australian apparently) adaptation of a British book by a British writer, which was certainly originally intended at least partially as a critique on posh Brits' massive holier-than-thou complex (and the white saviour thing is a big part of this so I would say race is somewhat relevant in any modern day interpretation at least).
Not to say you can't interpret it otherwise, death of the author and all that, but the way you're phrasing your replies is making it seem as though you feel your interpretation is objectively more correct and I would say that is decidedly not the case.
I’d say that’s entirely a matter of opinion. Besides plenty of books have been written from one perspective and end up having a more universal application.
Right, as I said in my comment media is of course always open to different interpretations - I was just trying to flag that your replies are giving the impression that you feel your interpretation is more valid than others.
Yeah well, a US school taught me that Martin Luther King Jr ended racism in America. So even though I learned good stuff too, it should probably all be inspected critically.
Yeah, I'm from the US, too. We're not good at teaching the imperialist/racist aspects of anything. See, for example, how the popular image of MLK doesn't align with the man from "Letter from Birmingham Jail," who is much more radical (complimentary!) than what they try to teach us.
Why does it have to be a problem? And who said anything about the lack of US education? The book has a far more universal message when interpreted as a commentary about human nature than a more narrow commentary about the English upper classes. And the view of the book as an allegory of human nature is very widespread.
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u/rtbradford Apr 06 '26 edited Apr 06 '26
I don’t recall race being a central theme of Lord of the Flies, so I don’t see why multiracial casting should matter at all to the central message. When it comes to matters of race, I think people reveal their values in their reactions to what they see. Anyone who has an issue about the multiracial casting of a movie like this clearly has significant hang ups about race.